After playing 60 minutes with ten men in Perth on Wednesday night, Ufuk Talay has found the positives despite ultimately feeling disappointed that his side didn’t get more from the match.
His side were on top, knocking the ball around HBF Park and were a goal to the good when the game hit a turning point when Jake Girdwood-Reich saw his challenge on Adam Taggart upgraded from a yellow card to a red card.
From there, the Sky Blues were on the back foot and defended stoutly with the Glory piling on the pressure.
The Head Coach lamented on the red and explained that it is a decision that the teenage central defender will learn from.
“I think when you look at something for four or five minutes you are always going to find something within it however you could say a little bit of inexperience with Jakey [Girdwood-Reich] as he doesn’t need to foul there. He probably needs to shepherd him toward the sideline and we don’t have an issue.
“That’s all learning moments for our young players and we’ve got two very young central defenders that I think have done a fantastic job these last few games,” Talay said.
“I am disappointed to walk away with one point when we possibly could have walked away with all three.”
This was the fourth time this season that Sydney have been reduced to ten men, all of which have come in the first half of matches and it has forced Ufuk Talay’s side to change the way they play.
They are known for their high intensity front foot playing style however with one man less, it opens up gaps and that is a risk that Talay isn’t willing to take instructing his side to sit back and hit on the counter.
The low block that they implemented won’t be staying around for much longer though he has assured fans.
“We don’t want to play that way [low block]. I don’t think that suits us as a club or as Sydney FC. As a big club we want to press, we want to dominate with and without the ball and we want to dictate things and that is something that we have done well in previous weeks.
“The boys and the staff know their roles and what they need to do and I think they do it quite well [with ten men]. We do need to add to the games those moments when we do win the ball how we need to break and try and create opportunities,” he added.
“We don’t want to play games with ten men at the end of the day but the boys worked very hard and I’m disappointed to concede via the set piece but overall pleased with the outcome.
“We’ve got four games to go. We need to get through these four games before we start thinking about finals football.”
Ufuk Talay will now take his side North to take on Newcastle Jets on Sunday afternoon kicking off at 3pm before returning home the week after for the next Sydney Derby.
